Playing House
by Franbunanza
Summary: A oneshot concerning Charlotte's search for her home. M for one sexual scene. Charladay


Disclaimer: I don't own any of this stuff.

A/N: Just a oneshot I wrote mostly in my head whilst driving earlier, pretty sure it counts as M but if its the one below lemme know ;D

* * *

Charlotte is eight years old, her younger sister Catherine, is three.

Together they organise a tea party in the little play house that their father, or at least Catherine's father, had built for them. Charlotte thinks she's too old now to hold pretend tea parties for their toys, but she doesn't make friends easily and so dotes on her little sister. Catherine holds out her cup and Charlotte tries carefully not to spill the orange juice she had filled the plastic tea pot with.

Catherine grins as she takes her cup back, her smile vanishes and turns to tears as she drops the cup and it splashes her dress it. Her elder sister has prepared for this eventuality and produces a cloth from under the small table. She mops up the juice and gives her little sister a cake decorated with pink icing because she knows it is her favourite. As the little blonde girl tucks in, with all sorrow of the spillage forgotten, her red headed sister peers out of the tiny window. Charlotte has to crouch slightly to see out, she looks up the garden path to their family home.

Charlotte wonders whether the little yellow house she used to live in still stands, she wonders if her father resides there all alone, she misses him and the swing set, she wonders if it was ever real.

Soon she will start asking questions, it will make her mother angry and sad so she will be carted of to see doctors who will in turn ask her questions. Charlotte will worry that her curiosity is hurting her mother, she will become withdrawn and spend more time on studying and less on playing. Another sister will be born and Catherine will play with her, rather than with Charlotte. They will love one another for always of course, but the closeness that they once shared will fade. This will set quite a trend for Charlotte who will find it difficult to forge close bonds from now on.

* * *

Her roommate at university is popular, and attending because she has the money to rather than the brains. She holds raging parties and gives little thought to Charlotte's possessions or privacy. Charlotte resents her, but it is not jealous, all the people who flock towards her roommate are fake and shallow, they use her for allsorts of filthy means. At the end of the day her roommate is as lonely as she, surrounded by humans but no genuine bonds.

Charlotte's genius is admired greatly by her class mates. They ask her questions about things they can't comprehend, but that come easy to Charlotte, she helps and is happy to put her knowledge to use. Never does she mention the island, because although they could be considered friends she knew they would think her crazy.

She is glad to leave the dorms she had lived in for three years, The library was more of a home to her during her time there.

* * *

The hotel in Fiji is horrible, Charlotte is glad that she would not have to stay for long. The wall paper might have once been cream but has now adopted a browning almost green shade. The blankets on the bed itch.

It had taken her longer than she had planned, at the age of thirty-four she had finally found hard evidence of the islands existence. Tomorrow she would be heading "home".

So why didn't she feel the elation she had always imagined she would have? Charlotte hugged her knees close to her as she sat at the bottom of the shower. The weak shower head dribbled lukewarm water down on to her head. It was pitiful, her tears fell with more gusto.

Charlotte shivers in the cold and chastises herself for being weak, she just feels so empty and for half a second she wishes she had someone to hold her, to assure her that she had not wasted her life on a fools endeavour and to tell her that even if she had it didn't matter because she was loved. Charlotte wiped her eyes, turned off the shower and wrapped a towel around her shoulders. Pity time was over, half a second was always half a second too long for Charlotte.

* * *

The Freighter was metallic and unsightly, it creaked and rocked at all times of the day. Charlotte is happy onboard the ugly old boat.

It's a perfectly clear night, Charlotte lays flat on her back and stares up at the cosmos. The sight is so beautiful that she can't believe that she'd never taken the time just to gaze upon it before. She listens as Daniel points out constellations, Charlotte knows them off by heart but she likes the way he speaks, soft and low, so she hangs on his every word.

She breaks her eyes away from the sky for a moment and looks to the left. Daniel lays beside her on the deck, she takes in his expression, he smiles so widely because he remembers them all. Charlotte smiles too, she finds that she can hardly help herself.

Dan props himself up on his elbows and breaks the bar of chocolate he had bought from the canteen in half. He tentatively offers her half, Charlotte says thank you and appreciates his generosity, what's his is hers and vice versa. They share everything, not just the tangible but the emotional as well. It is a completely alien sensation for Charlotte.

Tonight they will share his bed for the first time.

* * *

Charlotte tries to pinpoint the exact moment when it stopped being about comfort and release and became something more. She lays on the pile of blankets they had collected, whoever the little shelter belonged to was long gone, perhaps with Locke or maybe even dead.

Daniel's beard scratches her ever so slightly as he kisses her neck, he slides his fingers across her bare stomach. Charlotte closes her eyes and breathes out, because... oh god... he's so good with his fingers. It makes her even more desperate to hear him play piano.

When they started this she promised that it would just be about sex, so that they could just forget about their troubled pasts and empty lives for a few hours. It had worked, at least for the first few times.

She figured that it changed the day they had been separated after parachuting out of the helicopter. John Locke's group had taken her to the Dharma compound, she had been tied up to the swing set she had played on as a child and had laid her eyes upon the little yellow house she had called home. It wasn't enough, Charlotte felt nothing. As she followed Sayid over the hill and had been greeted by Dan's smile, that was when she felt as if she were really home.

She was angry with herself, she knew better than to fall for men who had lost love so tragically. How could she ever compare to Theresa? She had heard of her great kindness, beauty and agreeable manner whilst at Oxford, from what she had heard the woman was practically a Disney princess. Theresa was everything Charlotte was not. Dan chose this moment to kiss her lips, she would not know that at that exact moment he was likening her to a goddess, he thinks of how she has picked up the pieces of his broken heart and patiently fixed it. She is salvation and he's not sure if he deserves it.

Charlotte holds his shoulder and pulls him close until he is on top of her, her legs brush his as she wraps them around. Dan strokes her hair until his fingers are lost in it, he pushes into her. Charlotte gasps against his shoulder.

The way he looks at her helps quell her fears, all thoughts of not matching up to Theresa faded away forever. His deep warm eyes burned into hers with such unabashed love and adoration. Charlotte hopes that this look was reflected by her own expression, because she feels it, its just showing it that she has trouble with.

The way he moves drives her insane, so slow and deep that she feels it all over. Her body and her heart alight like never before. Charlotte thinks maybe she wasn't so weak for wanting this, she's only human after all.

His name escapes her lips, too loud, the others might hear. She could practically see Jin and Sun exchange amused glances, Charlotte bites down hard on her lip as to silence herself. Dan presses his thumb against her chin and gently removes her lip from her teeth. She groans out, encouraged he moves faster and harder, taking her to the edge and over it. Her name floods out of his mouth like a mantra as he follows. Charlotte grinned, a part of her wants _them_ to hear, so they would all know that he was hers.

He collapses down beside her, kisses her and holds her close. Her favourite times were when they were alone together, it made the run down little shelter feel safe, like a home but not one she had ever known before.

* * *

As Charlotte lays dying on the ground, her mind wanders. Fantasies of being Dan's wife taunt her. They could live in England or America or wherever, it wouldn't matter. They would buy a piano and he could play for her. She would probably disagree with his mother at Christmas, Dan would find this amusing, pleased that somebody finally stood up to his mom.

They'd keep a copy of William Shakespeare's "The Tempest" in the bookshelf and only they would get the reference.

Charlotte's heart broke as she felt death approach, it would have been so nice to live somewhere peaceful, somewhere far away, somewhere together.

* * *

Three years pass, Charlotte is now completely connected to the Island. She sits in front of "the Tempest" station, her legs crossed and her eyes closed, waiting.

The time is now, she feels it. He approaches like an oncoming storm. Charlotte hears each footstep thunder against the jungle floor, the branches snapping and cracking beneath his boots because he doesn't stop for a second.

She feels the wind and knows that it will pull back his long fringe from his face. Impatience wracks her body, so she gets to her feet and looks in all directions.

She chose this place because she knows he will find her here. It will be all instinct, he'll know the path to take, he'll know she'll be here waiting. She whispers _Daniel, _it rustles through the trees and spurs him on, he tries to run even faster and almost trips.

They hold each other once again, finally. It doesn't hurt as they fall to the ground in a mess of fumbling limbs and lips. They are together, heart beats synchronized with the throbbing pulse of the island. This place is death and this place is theirs. Charlotte laughs at the old cliché, it's where the heart is.

* * *

A/N: Reviews would be great, i'd love some feedback on this one


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